


Playacting

by disparity



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-14
Updated: 2016-11-14
Packaged: 2018-08-31 02:10:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8559292
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/disparity/pseuds/disparity
Summary: Isabela’s got three secrets that can kill you, and only the first two are daggers.





	

Isabela’s got three secrets that can kill you, and only the first two are daggers. The stiletto’s in her left boot because she kicks with her right, and there are cuts on her calves from the times it’s jostled out of place. The second blade you won’t find until she wants you to, and the only people she _doesn’t_ want to find it are the ones she can’t stab from the front. She’ll get you in the back more often than not because she likes to imagine the look on your face rather than seeing it.

People look comical when they die, but the noises are her favorite. Isabela’s seen theater troupes perform little plays on docks and hillsides, and they never do get the deaths right. She’s thought about showing them the proper way to cut a throat, because she just can’t stand amateurs, but the funny thing about death is you can’t learn from your own. Sometimes she’d like to bring back the people she’s killed just so they can make use of the lessons she’s taught them.

When Isabela kills, she thinks of the strangest things. She gets that thing, what do you call it, when it’s the first time you’ve done something but it feels like you’ve done it before? She feels as if she’s lived her entire life already. It’s like watching a play about a life she lived a long time ago, so she can’t remember all the details, but every once in awhile something just sticks. It’s like that when she kills. The deaths are already done, and she doesn’t really feel as if she’s causing them, just acting them out like it’s in the script.

She admits there’s similarities between the way she fights and the way she fucks, but she doesn’t see why everyone’s always pointing it out. _Yes, kitten, I did mean one night only,_ and it’s not as if she even _needs_ the sex anyway. Sure, she gets cross when she goes without, but she gets crosser when she’s hungry, and starvation can actually kill her (or at least try very, very hard, and she does admire that sort of effort).

What will she lose if she doesn’t take a pretty thing to bed every night? Not a sense of worth or desirability, not some horse shit about an emotional connection she doesn’t have the time for. She’ll lose an orgasm or several, but it’s just like missing out on booze. _Sure, that wine is expensive and I reckon it’ll taste divine, but I can swallow pisswater from a tankard, and I’ll still be drunk._

The only reason she needs other people at all is because sometimes it’s better than her hand. It’s _easier_ than her hand, too, which she does find a bit funny. She’s got looks and charm--and by charm she means tits--but she’s not a bloody queen, is she? She’s not the girl you pine for, unless you’re pathetic, and she isn’t some trophy to put on your shelf. It really shouldn’t be this easy, but it always is, and it’ll never stop baffling her.

The world’s mysterious like that, isn’t it, with all the different ways people look for meaning when it’s scarcer than anyone wants to admit. Some people do find meaning in sex and drink and gambling, and that’s just silly. You ought to find meaning in the Chantry or some shite, because they’re handing it out for free.

That’s the thing, though, because people _do_ believe in the Maker, but they still spend all this time looking for other things. _Yes, alright, we’ll take the Maker ‘til something better comes along. Hope it’s booze._ But there’s no meaning in booze, is there, and the only thing you find at the end of a bottle is an empty fucking bottle.

She’s not all that fond of the Maker herself, see, because he’s a bit of a bastard and he never did send down that bolt of lightning to strike her husband dead. Isabela’s learned that assassins are far more reliable than the Maker, even the shit ones. At least you always knows what a shit assassin will do--they’ll cut and run with the gold, or get captured or killed or whatever else happens to the ones that don’t know what the fuck they’re doing. But what does a shit god do? Don’t bloody know, do you, ‘cause you’re not meant to have seen one, because gods aren’t meant to be shit. So how would you even know if a god was shit or not? No one’s going to admit it if they are.

Isabela thinks about all these things, even when she doesn’t want to. It’s the burden of a clever woman to see everything--particularly the nasty bits, she’s found--and she’s not about to close her eyes for a second. That second is the one that’ll kill her, and she’s not dying, thank you, not today. She’ll not die tomorrow either, if she has any say. She’ll live forever because that’s how long it’ll take to learn everything she wants to.

She learns quick, Isabela, because that’s the only way to stay alive. Maybe other people don’t have to learn because their lives are bloody boring and not constantly in danger, but she’s never had the luxury of being boring. She rarely has to seek out thrills because they seem to find her either way. She has no complaints about her life. It’s made her strong, and she can’t stand the thought of being weak.

But really, that’s only because she knows she is.

 _Fuck,_  she is. What is she thinking, defying Castillon like this? It’s wiser to stay on his good side, and she’s always thought of herself as wise, but perhaps it’s wishful thinking. _Ah well, live and learn Isabela, and next time check the cargo before you agree to anything_.

She ends up in Kirkwall, and of course no one’s _seen_ the bloody Tome of Koslun, have they, because they’re all a bunch of blind sods. She’ll have to do this on her own, as always, so she gears up and does it. She keeps it at even when it makes her want to grind her teeth together. Maker, she’s never seen so many amateurs.

There’s one who’s not an amateur--and Hawke’s a blessing, really, or she would be if Isabela ever bothered to pray for one. She’s like sunshine on a calm sea, or something equally ridiculous. She makes Isabela feel a bit ridiculous, in fact, so she makes a point to distance herself. Can’t get hurt if she’s all the way over here, thanks.

But the thing is that Hawke’s an archer. No matter how far Isabela goes, Hawke can still find her and launch arrows that always find their mark. They open up her weak spots, and she _hates_ it because she thought she’d gotten rid of them all. But no, she’s a sentimental fool, and she falls for Hawke like one of her marks, stupid and stumbling.

Isabela can feel herself changing, and she panics because she doesn’t know if she ought to stop it. She doesn’t want to, but then she does. She wants Hawke but she doesn’t because Hawke is the most fantastic thing she’s ever seen, and Isabela already knows that she can’t hold onto the fantastic because it always leaves sooner or later. It’ll break her if it does. She already knows. She’s already _done_ this, she’s done it all, she’s made all these mistakes. And here she fucking goes again.

This is is the third secret, and lean in close now because it’ll never be more than a whisper: When you take away her daggers, she’s just a cynical whore who’s spent her whole life looking for something worth loving.

You won’t hear her say it unless she’s about to put one of her other secrets in your back.


End file.
